World of Card Games

Today is the first day of summer in the USA! World of Card Games has sponsored a flyer with word puzzles to celebrate summer in Boston. There's a crossword puzzle, some anagrams, and a word search puzzle. Have fun with it!

If you like word puzzles, you might want to try these holiday themed puzzlers, courtesy of World of Card Games. Enjoy! And Happy Holidays!

I took part in another tournament this morning. It was fun!

During the game I was presented with a bit of a puzzler. I was dealt 7 Spades but most of them were pretty low.

what would you bid with 7 Spades?

I wound up bidding 3, while nana bid 6. Notice the scores and bag situation. I've posted more details on Facebook here: https://www.facebook.com/WorldOfCardGames/photos/a.1453220478280028.1073741829.1384938725108204/1566662763602465/?type=1&theater

You don't have to be a Facebook user to see the Facebook post. I am curious to know what you would have bid, and why - you can comment here, or on Facebook.

Here's a screenshot from a recent Spades card game. Check out the scores: we are nearing the end of the game. My team needs to give 1 extra trick to our opponents in order to roll them. I have no Spades at all:

click image to enlarge

When I first got this hand, I was tempted to go nil, but I didn't like the situation in my Clubs cards; not even one really low card.

So I bid 1, hoping my partner and I could roll our opponents. I really didn't think I'd be able to take much with this hand, given that I had no Spades. Since I had no Spades, I knew everyone else was holding more Spades than usual, on average. I was counting on those Spades to win most of the tricks.

Alas it was not be! Here's the final score:

we got rolled!

I was surprised when I wound up taking 3 tricks! Of course, if I had bid 3, I probably would not have actually been able to take them. Our opponents gave me 2 tricks. They discarded a card on one of my Hearts instead of playing a Spade. And when I played my King of Diamonds, they didn't take it with the Ace.

Not only did our team not roll our opponents, we got rolled ourselves. We each wound up taking 2 extra tricks (IIRC our opponents had a total bid of 6).

I'm making this post because I'm curious to get comments about what you'd bid with the hand above. You can see the situation. It's near the end of the game, and I'd like to bid 5 so that we could possibly end with a win, but there's no way I'd get 5 points out of my hand. Possibly I should have bid 2? But we still wouldn't have won, even if we hadn't rolled. Anyone have a better idea?

Recently, a player at the site (you know who you are!) suggested that I add World of Card Games to the Chrome Web Store.

So here it is - World of Card Games at Chrome Web Store!

This won't matter to most people, who come to the site by typing the site name into their browser address bar. However, it will be handy for those who use Chrome's app launcher - you can just click on an icon and go directly to the site. It saves a little time.
If you like this widget, please give it a good review in the web store :) Remember, this widget is only available for Google Chrome. But anyone can play at the site - most browsers will handle the games without problems. Things do work best on Google Chrome, though.

If you experience any trouble with the widget, please let me know! I've tested and it works fine for me.

Last night, I attended another live, in-person card game session. We started out to play Spades. It turned out that my partner was new to the game, so it was decided to play a few rounds open-handed, so we could explain the rules and a bit of strategy. This turned out to be an interesting exercise.

Spades game, first hand, East leads. I'm playing the King and the Ace is still out there.

The initial hand is shown in the photo above. The dealer is North. I am South, and I bid 2. I did this despite the fact that I had a fairly strong set of spades. My thought process went like this in developing my bid:

• I have a lot of clubs, almost 50% of the clubs at the table. I can't count on the King of clubs winning a trick; it will very likely be trumped. So I won't include that in my bid.
• My diamond and hearts cards are useless.
• I may not be able to create a void very early in the game. I felt uncomfortable assuming that my one of my high spades would not be trumped by the Ace at some point.
• My best bet seemed to be aiming low, and dumping a couple high cards where possible. I figured that with a bid of 2, I might wind up with one bag if I took tricks with all of my spades cards. I thought that I'd pretty easily be able to dump the King of clubs.

Notice the total of all bids is 9! That leaves 4 bags on the table. After all bids were made, I was sure I'd make my bid, and definitely did not want to take a trick with the King of clubs.

The game started with East playing the 4 of clubs. With this play, it seemed unlikely to me that East was holding the Ace of clubs. I figured the Ace must be held by West or by my partner, North.

Whoever had the Ace was probably counting on using it to take a trick. I decided I would dump my King now. If my West opponent had the Ace, they would probably feel compelled to use it in order to make their bid. If my partner had the Ace, they would surely play it even though it meant trumping me. Anyone who plays a King in the first round must know that it will very likely be taken. My partner should realize that I knew that, and that I must be trying to dump my King. Especially seeing how many bags were at the table, it should be clear I was trying to get rid of a high card which might lead to a bag.

It turned out that my partner was holding the Ace of clubs. Since we were playing open-handed, my opponents both advised my partner not to trump me ("never trump your partner")... when in fact I wanted that to happen!

When I explained to the table my reasoning for playing the King, both of my opponents disagreed. They told me that if they were my partner, they would never overtrump me if they had the Ace - instead they would let me take the trick (in this case, this would likely lead to me earning at least one bag).

This kind of surprised me. In Spades, when there are so many bags on the table, it makes more sense to try to load the other team with all the bags, rather than to try to set them. So, I would try to take as few tricks as possible. I would assume my partner was aware that playing a King when the Ace has not yet been played would almost certainly lead to it being taken, and would therefore feel no need to refrain from trumping the King.

I am curious to know what other people think ... Do you just never trump your partner unless you have no choice? Or do you sometimes trump when it seems clear that they haven't planned on taking the trick?

A few days ago, I attended another live in-person card game event - my third!

We had an odd number of people, so it was decided to play a 5-person game of "Oh Heck!" while waiting for more to arrive. I have never played this before, and was taught the rules on the fly. I did not have a stroke of beginner's luck, and lost badly. It will take some practice to improve.

After this I moved on to a game of Spades. I had a great partner. We took the lead and never looked back. I knew that one of our opponents was a complete beginner, learning the game as we played. It was only after the game was over that I discovered that our other opponent was also relatively new to the game. So I felt a twinge of guilt. We should have arranged the partners differently so that the handicap was more even.

My last game of the evening was Hearts. I usually do poorly at Hearts... and I kept making errors in following suit or throwing out my card at the wrong time. It didn't help that I was getting tired. I wound up losing that game as well.

Despite the overall loss, I had a great time! For me, the social aspect of card games overrides my success ratio. I'm looking forward to the next event!

This Wednesday, April 16 2014, from 3pm to 4pm EDT, I will be online to play Spades at a private table at World of Card Games. Even though the table is private, everyone is welcome, so if you are free, come and join us. Keep reading for instructions.

I will be playing the variant of Spades in which players are not penalized for taking bags. Each bag is just worth an extra point, and they don't "roll over" when you accumulate 10 of them.

This variant is only available at private tables at the site. If you want to join my table, set your Spades options so that "Private Table" is checked. Set the private table name to worldofcardgames (all one word), and choose "No" for the "Bag Penalty" option. This set-up is shown in the screenshot here - make sure your settings match exactly!

Finally, hit the "OK" button, and you're ready. Click the Spades panel, and you'll be taken to a Spades game with these settings.

Keep in mind that there are 4 seats to a table. So if we get more than 4 people wanting to play, you may not see me - I may already be playing with 3 people at another table. This variation of Spades is shorter than the usual one, so I'm hoping to play several games over the hour. If you wait around, you will probably get to play a game eventually. I will be tweeting with updates occasionally. Check me out on twitter to find out what's going on: https://twitter.com/WorldOfCardGamz

I'll try to keep an eye on my email during the game, but I may not have time for anything more than very terse support emails.

PS For anyone who is not clear about it, the "Options" button is to the left and bottom of the Spades game panel. It is circled in green in this screenshot:
PPS I've set up a link at worldtimebuddy so that you can match the date mentioned above to your timezone - http://bit.ly/1grMFcO

To celebrate the upcoming Easter holiday, 6 new avatars have been added to World of Card Games. Happy Easter everyone!





There's also a small change to the "no bag penalty" option in Spades, which was introduced a couple of weeks ago. Previously the option was "Yes" or "No," which made it very exclusive.

This has been changed to be similar to the "Bots" option. Now, there is a radio button with the choices "Yes," "No," or "Either." The option is turned off by default, which means you can continue to play games in the usual way without doing anything.

If you absolutely love the "no-bag-penalty" variation of Spades and only want to play that way, edit your Spades options and hit "Yes" next to the "No Bag Penalty?" question. If you are happy to play either way, choose "Either."

Note: If you are the first person to be seated at a table, your options decide how the table rules are configured. If the "No Bag Penalty" option is set to "Either" or "No" then the table does not use the new option. If you set it to "Yes," then the table will apply the "No Bag Penalty" rule.

Once seated at a table, you can check what the options are by clicking the "table info" link at the bottom left of the screen:

I've played with the new option, and it's fun! I had to adjust my usual strategy a bit, which has been interesting. Also, if you prefer shorter games, this option makes the game go more quickly.

Last night, I attended my second live, in-person card game event. It's been over a month since my last event, so it's about time.

These games last much longer than an online game. I arrived at 7, left at 9:30, and only had time for one game of Spades. There's no timer at the table, and people are talking and eating... That makes a difference.

My partner and I managed to win the game! It was touch-and-go for a while. I got set when bidding nil; I had a decent hand for a nil bid, but had too many medium-value cards in the clubs suit. Our luck turned later in the game. We were able to set our opponents, and then my partner managed to pull off a nil bid when she was holding the King of Spades! A desperate ploy! Fortunately, I was holding the Ace, and was able to cover her. This nil put us ahead, and undoubtedly won us the game.

These events are a lot of fun... I highly recommend that you get out and play some card games, if you can. Meetup is a great resource for finding card game groups. If you don't have the time, or can't get out, head on over to World of Card Games for the next best thing.

Last night, I met up with some folks for a few card games. This was the first time I ever played Spades or Hearts offline!

It turned out to be a lot of fun. It was a little disconcerting to play with real cards at first, but I found that my "training" from playing at World of Card Games had really paid off. After a bumpy start, I was soon using the same strategies that I've developed online.

dealing a round of Spades

I noticed a few crucial differences between card games on the website and those in real life.

For one, games take longer in meatspace! The dealer has to shuffle the deck and deal out cards, and players have to sort the cards in their hands. The score has to be totted up after each hand. All of that takes longer when the computer is not doing it for you.

In addition, games are more confusing and disorganized in real life! For example, in a game of Spades at World of Card Games, the computer tells you who deals. In real life, it's up to the players to keep track. After many hands of cards have been played, people tend to forget who dealt last. Was it you... or me... or...?? And in Hearts, the computer tells you whether it's time to pass cards left, right, or across, or whether it's a no-passing round. Not so in real life! I realized I've been relying on the computer to do these things, and I found I lost track easily.

Anyway... here's a brief summary of the games last night.

We started with a few hands of 3-player Hearts, since not everyone had arrived and we didn't have a full set of four players. Once we got four players, we switched to a game of Spades. I enjoy Hearts, but I prefer Spades, so I was happy to switch.

My partner and I failed to make our bid, and got set in the very first round - we would have to dig our way out of a negative score. Soon thereafter, we ran into some luck when one of our opponents (I'll call him West) bid nil, and their partner (East) failed to cover. After we set them, we learned that East had not had to cover a nil-bidder before, and didn't realize what she was doing by leading with a low card - so we got an unfair handicap there. At this point, our opponents were in a negative-score hole!

We managed to set our opponents 2 or 3 times, burying them. They never recovered, and we won!

Afterwards, we played another game of 3-player Hearts. By some kind of miracle, I won this game! (I almost never win at Hearts, online.) I snapped a shot of the scores as evidence, see below. For anyone who does not play Hearts - it's a game of trick avoidance, and the low score wins. Notice my opponents tied for second place, which is a bit unusual!


I'm looking forward to more games in real life. But it's nice to be able to sit down and play a game online when I've got the time - no commuting necessary!

How about you - do you play cards in "real life" or only online? If you've never played with others in real life - I encourage you to find a group to play with. It adds a whole new dimension of fun to it!